This paper explains how transforming healthcare to involve the public can save money and improve lives. 

Key findings

• The only way to develop cheaper, more effective patient–centred services and approaches to public behaviour change is for the NHS to adopt radical new ways of innovating
• Genuine power will have to be given to frontline staff and patients. Similarly, communities will have to be given genuine leadership in behaviour change initiatives in order to make them more effective
• The opportunities that could be created by this radical shift in power and autonomy are too significant to ignore

The National Health Service needs to save £15 billion to £20 billion over the next few years.

This paper argues that these savings could be achieved through radical patient-centred service redesign and more effective approaches to public behaviour change. These approaches are difficult to develop within the existing health service, but radical new ways of innovating, as set out in this paper, can unlock the savings needed as well as improve health. 

Authors

Laura Bunt, Michael Harris